To get the latest update check the Ninja-Ja Game Downloads page. We sent an email out with a link to everyone who purchased it but if you never got it or need some assistance just email me atdbell1984@gmail.comwith the email address you used to make the purchase or TrialPay offer and I'll look into it for you.

Hey guys! Dan here, just letting you know there is now a new version of Ninja-ja out for those interested. It's still just survival at the moment but now you get to see your score and store it so you can try breaking your own records. Eventually you'll be able to compare your scores against others but it's not set up yet.

I'm hoping to start getting into some story elements soon as well as some RPG elements to give it more replay value. Right now it's more of a fun thing to just do every now and then but I'm hoping to turn it into something that gives you a sense of progress and accomplishment.

Also, don't worry! We haven't forgotten about the weapon/projectile requests that came with your purchase. I'll get to those eventually, just not yet.

Here's the list of changes:

Android Graphics (One step closer in bringing it to the phone markets)

Hey guys! Welcome to another week of Sam and Dan Games and Pokemon Tower Defense! Let's get this show rolling.

First of all a lot of people are confused about this latest update. Why are there generation 2 pokemon? Why can't I keep them? Why are there birds in Route 2? Why can't I use the dogs on the new Gym level? Why are you only giving away 10, it's not fair! Well I'm going to tell you!

Most of my success is going to be dependent on how much fun and enjoyment I can provide you guys. I have to keep you guys excited about the game, provide a good flow of content updates, and I also have to keep the game stable and secure. To make something fun you have to have an element of surprise. People are surprised by unexpected and new things. This update was an attempt to shake things up a little and add some nice but temporary surprises.

Guys I will let you decide the fate of the dogs for this game, please vote on the poll and let your voices be heard. I'm listening.

Think about it, it is better to have legendary dogs and lose them than to never have had them at all. Something like that...Also the birds, they are not meant to be captured, they exist to give the dogs meaning. It also plays into the story, Gary has escaped the birds (see the Vermillion Gym level for details on how) and now the birds are going all over the place to find him.

About the non Generation 1 pokemon, Generation 1 just doesn't have enough legendary pokemon to fit into the story I have in mind.

You can't use the dogs in the new gym level because it would have made the level a lot easier which I obviously didn't want.

About the contest, life is a lot about being in the right place at the right time. Those 10 people just happened to be there and they got the job done. The reason I didn't announce the contest is because I didn't have it planned at all. Still I know a lot of you want a reward for beating such a hard level. So next update I will be changing the hard Vermillion Gym into a challenge mode and the prize will be a new avatar for either boy or girl. The avatar will be your character wearing a mask of either Raikou, Entei, or Suicune. Special Thanks to Forum user KimmyLube for creating these mask! Please vote on the poll to pick which mask should be given out for beating the the challenge level. The other two mask will be given out as part of two new achievements that have to do with the challenge level.

Raikou mask, regular colors for boys, and shiny color for girls

Entei Hat

Suicune Hat

WHERE IS MY MEW???! By the time you are reading this all your Mew will be gone. Let me explain a bit of back story on the situation. There was a time not so long ago that you could duplicate your pokemon and even create pokemon out of thin air! Can you believe it?!?!?! Anyways, I want to make sure that everybody who bought Hero edition or Donated in the past doesn't feel like it was a waste a time since everybody was getting Mew. Since I can't really tell which ones are legit and which ones are not in the old system I have to completely erase them and start again. If you ever donated or bought Ninja-ja Hero edition please send me an email with the subject "Mew Permission" and inside include the email you used to pay with paypal and your account email for the game. I will insert 3 lvl 40 mew intro your trading account that you can pick up for any of your profiles. But Sam I traded for my Mew?! I'm sorry to say that I can't really help you with that since I can't tell if the person that traded you actually owned a legit mew.

Okay so on to the update this week! Here is what I have so far for the update:

New Story Level (100%)

Intro (100%)

Level Layout (100%)

Level Waves (100%)

Ending (100%)

2 New Pokemon to Capture in the wild (100%)

Graphics (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

New Moves (8) (100%)

Add pokemon's stats into the game (100%)

2 New Evolutions (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

Graphics (100%)

Add pokemon's stats into the game (100%)

1 New Pokemon to trade with an NPC (100%)

Shiny Graphics (100%)

Graphics (100%)

New Moves (4) (100%)

Add pokemon's stats into the game (100%)

New Challenge Mode (100%) - Original Vermillion Gym

Level Cap up to 42 (100%)

New Moves (6) (100%)

New TM (100%)

Substitute

HM Cut and Flash (100%)

Getting the NPC Trade pokemon (100%)

Rename the Trading Center to Pokemon Center (100%)

2 New Achievements for the New Challenge Level (100%)

3 New Avatars (100%) - Raikou, Suicune, and Entei Mask

Removing Legendary Birds from the levels (100%)

Removing the boost in experience that was added for the event (100%)

Removing the boost on shiny encounter rate that was added for the event (100%)

Popup alert when a shiny or special pokemon (possibly the dogs) shows up on a level (100%)

Pokemon that evolve by trading will now get their correct nickname if it didn't have a nickname before that. Ex (Kadabra will be correctly called Alakazam once he evolves) (100%)

The TradeID for your pokemon now shows up in the "Your Request" section on the trading center (100%) Thanks Trevor!

Adding a Save Confirmation Screen (100%) Thanks Darren!

Add an auto-save when pressing the trading button (100%) Thanks Mr!

Making Story Mode Vermillion Gym level easier (100%)

Ability to put who you want for a trade when posting a trade (Postponed until sometime this week)

Inventory (100%) - View your items and change your avatar, will be similar to the trading center page, meaning on a separate website.

Search Trades by Account Username (100%) Thanks Drew L.!

Version Check (100%)

Bug Fixes (100%)

Life bar is too big for some pokemon when you first catch them (100%)

Trading with the NPC will now give the pokemon the correct nickname (100%)

Pokemon that evolve and have a default nickname will now get the correct nickname (100%)

Fixed issues with stopping and starting the music that caused crashes in levels when opening the menu or leveling up and evolving your pokemon (100%)

Ninja-ja Update: It's almost done, Dan is just about finished with it so it will come out early next week.

First 10 people that beat the new gym level, and send me an email with some sort of proof (screen shot, or just send me your account email so I can confirm it) will get to keep one of the legendary dogs forever! Okay we found our winners, I will be announcing them on Monday! Thanks to all who sent in an email, also see I told you the level isn't impossible ;) I made this contest just to prove that.

Alright well it's finally here! After all the blood, sweat and tears!Let's look at what we added in this version and let's look at where you can enjoy the game.

Added on v3.3:

The Trading Center is now open for business! - Trade your pokemon with other trainers, search for trades, and transfer your pokemon from one profile to the other. Without all that nasty duping!

New Story Level - Vermilion Gym! - Will Joey finally know your gender? What has Brock been up to? Just how hard is that gym level? Find out this plus more!

Increased Experience Gain! - Earn 50% more experience per kill! This will only last a week!

Increased Shiny Encounter Rate! - 300% more of a chance to see shiny pokemon in the wild! This will only last a week!

Player Avatars! - You can now choose an avatar from your character, play the new level to choose! More different avatars will be added later.

Legendary Pokemon Hunt! - Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres have invaded Route 2, Route 3, Viridian Forest 2, Mt Moon 1, and Route 5. Use the help of Entei, Raikou, and Suicune to help you defeat their attack! After this week Entei, Raikou and Suicune will return to where they came from (I'm removing them from the game, enjoy it will you can :D)

Bug Fixes! - About a million bugs squashed! Check out the previous blog for more info.

I hope you guys will enjoy this update and much as I enjoyed making it. We got a great week coming up including the selection of the new title screen. I'll be talking more about that on Monday. Until then enjoy the game and as always let me know what you think.

The reason many of you couldn't save is that the server that I'm paying for only allows 150 connections on at the same time. So I payed for an upgrade to the server to allow double that. The upgrade takes about 24 hours so you will be seeing the difference soon.

I think that the auto-save is saving too often I will be moving it so that it saves after the level is finished and when you press back on the "Mode select" screen. Right now when you enter the "Mode" Screen it will save automatically I will change it so it happens when you press back from that screen. Meaning when you go back to your profile selection.

Also I will add a manual save button in the "Mode" screen that way if you feel unsure you can just manually save. These changes should lower the amount of saving going on thus decreasing the server load and reducing all problems with saving.

Okay moving on. The poll seems to be busted (No, you aren't the only person that voted everybody is seeing their vote as the only one). But I'm pretty sure nobody is against and Experience Gain and Shiny Encounter Rate boost for this week coming week only. The reason for this is many people weren't saving their profile online and when this new version came out they ended up losing a lot of their progress. This boost will help you get back to where you were before.

The boost will be 50% more experience on all kills.Shiny Rate will go from 0.1% to 0.4% that is four times more likely to find a shiny.

Both of these will go back down for the update after.

This update I hope will be really exciting! There will be a one week only event and you will have a chance to fight and use legendary pokemon. There will be 3 mystery code hunts this weekend one for each of the legendary dogs. After the week is over the legendary dogs will no longer be available and will be removed from everybody's account. The point of having them is to have a fun one time event, and being able to have pokemon with massive power. I hope you guys enjoy it.

On top of that there will be a new story level, featuring the S.S. Anne, and a gym battle so I hope you guys can enjoy that.

Before I forget to mention, we added a new way to get Ninja-ja: Apprentice Edition for free. Click on this link or go to the "Get Ninja-ja" page and click on the get it free button. Basically if you can complete any of the offers on that page then you get the game for free. If you guys want me to have this available for the other version of the game let me know.

Also soon we will have a completely free version of Ninja-ja that doesn't include any of the prizes, so look forward to that also.

Last I leave you with the progress list:

Increase Experience Gain by 50% (100%)

Increase Shiny Rate by 300% (Thanks Macmads!) (100%) - The shiny rate is now 0.4% for this update.

Legendary pokemon to add (6) (100%)

Graphics (100%)

New Moves (3) (100%)

Thunder (100%)

Fire Blast (100%)

Blizzard (100%)

Add these pokemon's stats to the game (100%)

New Story Level (100%) - Battle against Lt. Surge!

Opening Scene (100%)

Ending Scene (100%)

Level Graphics (100%)

Level Layout (100%)

Level Waves (100%)

Trading Center (100%) - The trading center is now open for business, you don't have to wait until v3.3 is out!

All three of your profiles will be under one Account. You can have a nickname for your account and change it as you wish. (100%)

Choose one of your profile's avatars and set it as your Account's Avatar. (100%)

Pick one of your pokemon and create a new trade that other players can search for (100%) - Creating a trade will remove the pokemon from your profile so you won't be able to use him in game. You can call him back by going to the "Your Trade Request" section and calling him back to any profile.

Give your pokemon a new nickname (all pokemon are named "bob" by default) (100%) - You can only nickname pokemon that are originally yours. You won't be able to change the nickname of other trainer's pokemon.

Search all the trades available and request a trade (100%) - Search for a specific pokemon, shiny or non shiny, or search using a specific tradeID that you have received from somebody.

View all your request, and call back pokemon that you no longer wish to trade to any profile. Accept request to complete trades with other trainers (100%)

Player Avatars (100%) - Select your gender to have your very own avatar!

Changed location of auto save (100%) - It no longer triggers after you beat a level, or when you enter the "Mode" screen. It triggers when you press back on the mode screen. You can now manually save by pressing the save button on the "Mode" Screen.

Ninetails will now be able to relearn Nasty Plot while Arcanine will no longer be able to relearn it. (100%)

Fixed Flamethrower and Hydro Pump hitting everybody with the same damage as the target. (Example: If your flamethrower target was a water pokemon it would hit everybody with weaker damage and it would show as hitting everybody with the "not effective" color.) (100%)

Sunday, July 10, 2011

The update is "unofficially" out, you can get it here on my blog (click the Play PTD tab). But I'm holding off "officially" releasing it until I patch up a few things. Holding off the downloads (apk..etc) until v3.2.1.

What needs to be patched up?The game only saves when you beat or exit a level, so if you pressed back all the way to the profile page you would lose all that you didn't save.

Also sometimes the save gets stuck.

Also some people had problems logging in but that is mostly fixed.

What are you going to do about it?I'm going to have a cancel button on the save screen so you can get out of it if it gets stuck.

Also I will make the game save in more "important" spots and moments so you don't lose anything like achievement rewards.

A lot of people got the shiny tentacool but then accidentally pressed back all the way to the profile page and thus lost their shiny tentacool. So once I patch things up I will reset all the rewards so that you can get them again, and no you won't have to complete the achievement again if you already did.

Sounds good, so when can we expect this?You can expect this early next week along with an early version of the trade center.

So when do we get content!?Content is coming next weekend!

So why do these "bugs" happen?It comes down the the amount of time I have to design, code, and est the game. The game is in alpha so it's going to break a lot and have a lot of bugs. While some might say then don't release it until it's done I think that the game can end up being better if everybody can play it before it's done. You guys give me great feedback that directly impacts the game, and if I just waited until the game was done who knows how different it would be from where we are now.

So I hope you guys enjoy yourselves and I'll be seeing you guys on Monday. As always, let me know what you think.

Okay we are back on air and ready to roll. If you have read my past blogs you will know that right now I'm concentrating on security, so this week's update will be all about that. Unfortunately new content will have to wait while I make the game secure.

But just like last week I will squeeze in a new pokemon hunt along with a new achievement. The pokemon hunt and achievement will be like before the hunt will get you the non shiny version and the achievement will get you the shiny version and also like last week it will be a pokemon that you can't capture in the game currently. I will post a poll with 3 possible achievement challenges and you guys will decide what gets in the game.

Speaking of achievements, I made a change on my achievement server code. Now you can receive the achievement reward 3 times! You only have to do the achievement once for all your profiles but now you get 3 rewards instead of just one. Enjoy! Note: This works right now on v3.1.5, you don't have to wait for the new update to receive the rewards.

Also I wanted to publicly thank a good friend Haplo the owner of Haplo Rp Haven for helping me basically cut out most of the regular and shiny pokemon sprites. Thanks Haplo!

What's coming this weekend:

Must have an online profile to play. (100%)

Internet required to log into the profile (100%)

Auto Saving online (100%) - The game will try to save your profile online at certain points in the game (example: After you quit or finish a level) if you are online the game will save automatically. If you don't have internet at the time the game will show a message asking you to try again or to cancel. Meaning you can play offline but if you don't save at some point and close the game all the progress you made won't be saved. So you have to be online to log in, but you can then play offline until you decide to stop. When you decide to stop go back online and trigger a save. If you are always online on the phone or computer then just play normally.

Trading Center (Postponed for during the week)

Transfer between profiles (Postponed for during the week)

New pokemon for hunt and achievement (100%)

Graphic (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

Add this pokemon's stats to the game (100%)

New move (1) (100%)

New Evolution for hunt and achievement pokemon (100%)

Graphic (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

Add this pokemon's stats to the game (100%)

Add Achievement (100%)

Distribution (0%)

Pokemon Tower Health (100%) - You will now notice a health bar on top of your towers. Right now none of the moves in the game will hit your pokemon. So this change really has no real meaning yet. In the future for "Advanced Mode" moves can hit your towers, and moves can heal your towers.

Bug Fixes

Making Staryu show up in the pokedex after you evolve it to Starmie (100%)

Pressing back after selecting a level will now take you to the correct chapter (100%)

Starmie will now learn the proper TMs (100%)

Toxic Spikes and Stealth Rock not dissapearing (100%)

As always I will be updating this as I work on it during the week. Let me know what you think!

Hey guys! Sorry for the long delay on this Ninja-ja update. We've decided that it would be good if I (Dan) learned a bit more programming in order to free up Sam so that he can focus more on PTD stuff. So these first few Ninja-ja updates will most likely be a bit smaller and take longer than expected but we'll catch up over time and make it worth your while!

The Android version of Ninja-ja is on hold for now. We know a lot of you are requesting it but it introduces some issues that we're still dealing with. We'll definitely be releasing it in the near future though and possibly for the iPhone as well.

We've got a lot of cool stuff planned for Ninja-ja and there's certainly a good amount of you interested in it so you can expect a lot more to come!

This time we'll be sending out an email to everyone that purchased Ninja-ja which will include a link to the Ninja-ja updates page. Here you'll be able to grab any version of the game including all future updates. If you don't get the email within a few days email me atdbell1984@gmail.comHere are the current changes in this update:

So I have a small surprise for you guys, there will be an update this weekend!

It is actually so small that I waited all this time to mention it. It will have a new shiny hunt for this week very similar to the Onix one. This week you get Regular Staryu for your shiny hunt. Just like Shiny Onix, I'm adding a new non luck based (meaning you don't have to get lucky to beat the achievement) achievement to get Shiny Staryu. Like I said it is a small update but it gives you something to do.

Adding Staryu to the game (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

New Move Camouflage (100%)

Adding Starmie to the game (100%)

Shiny Graphic (100%)

Adding new achievement to the game (100%)

This whole week I haven't been slacking off. While I haven't been able to answer any comments I do read them before I publish them and even if I don't publish them I read them. But besides that I have been hard at work on one particular part of the game. Which part of the game you might ask?

I've been working on Security. Security is always a high priority, you don't want to lose your save file because it wasn't secure. You don't want to spend all this time trying to clear an achievement and have somebody else cheat. You don't want to pay for something and then watch somebody else get it for free. Unless you are the one cheating and getting what you want without any effort.

I always get emails with all the latest hacks and all the latest generators and what not, I know how these things work. I see the holes that they have been using, I see the holes in my game that create vulnerabilities.

So I have been working hard this week, and I'm not done yet, to fill these holes. I can see the comments now... "Who cares about the holes?! work on levels!", "The holes are fun, I like getting stuff easily!" but this is something that must be done.

What does it mean for you, the player?

The game will save online automatically. No more hassle of forgetting to save and then next week your profile is deleted.

You will have to be online to start playing and to save after every level or when you are doing an achievement. You need to be online to save your progress.

The new trading center is also part of security. Trade yourself without the hassle of codes. Find a list of what others want for a particular pokemon as simple and hassle free as possible.

That is my main priority right now. The reason is that I want to start adding cool achievements and prizes for the achievements and daily codes but if most can just get it by cheating then it's not worth doing. I might as well just fill your profile with every pokemon at level 100 and call it a day.

Before anything else these things need to be completed, in my opinion, for me to feel the game is ready to move forward. This is my decision.

After this comes new levels, move balancing, tower health, new attacks, new pokemon etc.

Okay so let's talk about Classic Mode.

I think I didn't really describe classic mode that well to you guys. So I will try to explain it more clearly.

Classic Mode is:

Think of it as an Easy Mode.

All moves will use the original game's value (Using Generation 5's data).

Most moves will have cooldowns of 18 or lower (for quick attack, extremespeed), some moves that take two turns might have higher cooldowns (like hyper beam).

Your tower's won't have health at all, so they can't faint.

It will have the exactly same levels as the other mode ("Advanced Mode"), because of this the levels will be easier to beat in Classic mode.

Advance Mode is:

Think of it as a Normal Mode.

Moves will be balanced so that moves aren't extremely better than others. Using my design with feedback from you guys.

Most moves will have cooldowns of 18 or lower (for quick attack, extremespeed), some moves that take two turns might have higher cooldowns (like hyper beam).

Your Towers will have health so they can faint. But most of the damage will come from moves with recoil, and moves that hit the whole screen. This will help moves that restore your health and give you extra defense be very useful while defending.

It will have the exactly same levels as the other mode ("Classic Mode"), because of this the levels will be harder to beat in Advanced mode.

As you can see the only difference will be in tower health and move attack power numbers. Basically I have to switch a couple of numbers and I have a whole new mode. It's not going to take a lot of hard work at all.

Are you still with me?

Last thing I want to talk about is the future!

I wanted to talk about the plans after all this is done.

My plan is to not increase the level cap from 40 until we start reaching the 4th gym.

New levels

New challenges

More new pokemon to catch.

More new TMs.

Adding all the required relearn moves such as (Thunder Fang, Flash Cannon)